Let us begin with a hypothetical situation wherein let’s say you are left to fend for yourself in a jungle and with no absolute skills to manoeuvre your survival instincts and thought process. The only company you have is solitude and fear which has overwhelmed your mind so much so that it plays only morbid ideas. The situation is so overpowering that you may not even give a chance to your mind of thinking rationally to overcome the situation. Hence, what is the solution? Do you give up or fight to the end?
The present pan world epidemic fits well with aforementioned problem. But instead we are all together in this and do not have the luxury of available vaccine for the pandemic. Nevertheless, we might ask ourselves, has this stopped us from making possible endeavours to combat the disease? In my view the answer is an absolute no. On the contrary, the world has come together like never before and has prioritised researching new vaccines for COVID-19. Having said this India too have been in the forefront of developing its own vaccine undertaken by India based Bharat Biotech International Ltd[1] and Zydas Cadila Health Care. What does this mean in the present context for India or for that matter the entire world?
This goes on to show that we have not yet given up on our common enemy and efforts are on to defeat this pandemic. We have chosen to fight this enemy with available knowledge in the field of medical science albeit we don’t have remedy for the same. A crisis is a good teacher, it teaches you to find ways explored never before with favourable results.
These difficult times among many things should teach us not to abandon the positive things in our life and be depressed. We need to adopt optimistic and holistic approach in our life like interdisciplinary education. Multiple specialised studies may be encouraged and should be the need of the hour to counter present crisis. This may also set a precedent for future endeavours and pre-empt, lest, any such crisis is encountered. All Academicians, Scholars, Industrialists, pharmacists, virologists and other stake holders should collaborate to design consolidated expertise to tackle such problem present at hand with future references. One such study that should be solicited is in the area of environmental law with robust environmental legislation biding upon all the nations to address such eventuality.
Presently with little improvement in the air and water quality even in urban areas, signifies that the pandemic has lessened the human encroachment on nature even if it is just momentarily. But the real question is what will happen after the pandemic subsides? As the global economy is facing severe challenges the best thing the Governments are expected to do is to stabilise the major setback in the economy. Now while doing so will they overlook all the necessary environmental regulation, or the “green tape” as it’s often called. The UNEP (United Nation Environment Program) is worried about achieving sustainable development goals[2] in post-pandemic era as there is a possibility of increasing threat to different sustainable development goals such as, climate action or responsible consumption or production.
Many corporations might ignore the environmental regulations and might tear off the ‘green tape’ to achieve the losses they suffered in past months. Even the governments may reduce budgets towards various environmental funds to meet the deficits. But the consequences would be severe and the future crisis might be more serious than the present pandemic.
One may think that why am I talking about this while discussing studying environmental law? well environmental law is not only studying about Climate and environment but also to scrutinize the legal issues ascending from matter involved thereto. One can choose a career as a lawyer or a policy maker, or non-profit leader and can make a change in existing policy and law, rather than enforcement. This discipline is so much more than just climate and ecology. It gives you the scope of gaining knowledge concerning advocacy skills which will help you to put the ‘green tape’ on the legal framework rather than tearing it off.
The local government machinery in collaboration with Universities, Government Institutions and other participants should play a pivotal role in developing practical solutions factoring in environmental consequences that may arise as result of any unknown pandemic. The aspiring students should not shy away from taking up environmental law as their mainstream courses and should come forward with great fervour in being responsible and valuable world citizens to address such crisis.
On a concluding note it may be said aptly that crisis comes with opportunities and open up avenues never treaded before. However, it depends on whether or not we want to move out of our comfort zone. Time is synonymous to change, a change we shall all be ready to adapt to cater to our present while looking forward for building a better future for the world. This is the time where we should focus more on returning back to the mother earth and think of maintaining the balance by fulfilling the goals of sustainable development.
It is the time where we should explore the route of environmental lawyering as a career and help the world with better environmental regulations and policies which never leads to tear the ‘green tape’ off.
[1] Available at https://thelogicalindian.com/fact-check/covaxin-bharat-biotech-vice-president-vk-srinivas-human-trial-22117, last visited on 27.07.2020
[2] Available at https://www.iucn.org/news/world-commission-environmental-law/202004/environmental-rule-law-pandemics-now-and-next-time-americas, last visited on 31.07.2020
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